Bethesda hosts Festival Celebration for new pastor

Rev. Angela Jean Freeman-Riley will be formally welcomed to Bethesda-on-the-Bay Lutheran Church on May 7.

Bethesda-on-the-Bay Lutheran Church will formally welcome its new pastor, the Rev. Angela Jean Freeman-Riley, at a Festival Celebration and Installation at 4:30 p.m. on Sunday, May 7. A reception will follow the Installation Service. The public is welcome to attend.

Pastor Angela arrived at Bethesda Feb. 20 following a 16-month search led by the church’s nine-member Call Committee. Bethesda’s long-time pastor, the Rev. Dennis Stylski, retired Oct. 1, 2015, after 38 years of service at Bethesda.

Pastor Angela most recently served as the part-time interim pastor at Trinity Lutheran Church in Lakewood after the retirement of their pastor of 25 years. From 2012-2015, she was co-pastor at the Lutheran Church of Honolulu in Hawaii. Before moving to Hawaii, she served seven years as pastor of First Lutheran Church in Malden, Massachusetts. She also was a community development pastor in Marshfield, Massachusetts, an intern pastor at the International Church of Copenhagen in Denmark, and an intern at the famous Thomaskirche (St. Thomas Church) in Leipzig, Germany, where Johann Sebastian Bach had served as music director.

Celebrating its 70th anniversary, Bethesda-on-the-Bay Lutheran Church holds Sunday services at 8:30 a.m. and 11 a.m. For more information, visit  www.bethesdaonthebay.org or call the church office at 440-871-2276. Bethesda-on-the-Bay is located at 28607 Wolf Road. 

Gary Weiland

Free-lance writer and public relations consultant.

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Volume 9, Issue 9, Posted 10:01 AM, 05.02.2017